The Balloon-borne Large-Aperture Submillimeter Telescope ( BLAST ) carried out a 250 , 350 and 500 µm survey of the galactic plane encompassing the Vela Molecular Ridge , with the primary goal of identifying the coldest dense cores possibly associated with the earliest stages of star formation .
Here we present the results from observations of the Vela-D region , covering about 4 { deg } ^ { 2 } , in which we find 141 BLAST cores .
We exploit existing data taken with the Spitzer MIPS , IRAC and SEST-SIMBA instruments to constrain their ( single-temperature ) spectral energy distributions , assuming a dust emissivity index \beta = 2.0 .
This combination of data allows us to determine the temperature , luminosity and mass of each BLAST core , and also enables us to separate starless from proto-stellar sources .
We also analyze the effects that the uncertainties on the derived physical parameters of the individual sources have on the overall physical properties of starless and proto-stellar cores , and we find that there appear to be a smooth transition from the pre- to the proto-stellar phase .
In particular , for proto-stellar cores we find a correlation between the MIPS24 flux , associated with the central protostar , and the temperature of the dust envelope .
We also find that the core mass function of the Vela-D cores has a slope consistent with other similar ( sub ) millimeter surveys .